Ex-Word of Faith Testimony of Pastor John Edwards (Junker Jorge)

Special thanks go out to MKayla for transcribing this video. She did a great job

JOHN EDWARDS TESTIMONY:

Hey guys! My name is John Edwards. I’m a Rhema Graduate. I went to Rhema Bible Training Center in 96-98 and I was ordained by Kenneth Hagin and came to Alabama, started a church called The Edge then we changed the name to Hillside Church.

About January of 2008 I decided to leave the Word of Faith Movement. What I want to do is to put together a series of YouTubes; I want to help people out there who are trapped in the Word of Faith.

Word of Faith is a dangerous, cultic movement. And it’s so similar to the new age message that it’s right there beside it – and it sucks you in. Word of Faith – what attracted me to it is that I thought I could have a say in my life. I always had fear of maybe losing my kids or getting cancer or going bankrupt. I heard the Word of Faith message as it was presented by Kenneth Hagin and it gave me hope that I could have a say for my life.

And the dangerous thing about the Word of Faith is that it puts the believer in the driver’s seat and it puts God and His will and His plan for your life in the back seat. The whole Word of Faith movement is based on one passage of scripture in Mark chapter 11, verse 23, Jesus said “Whosoever shall say to until this mountain be thou removed and be thou cast into the sea and shall not doubt in his heart thou shall believe those things that he sayeth, the things shall come to pass and he shall have whatsoever he said”.

Now what they did – Jesus was a Jewish Rabbi; He spoke in Aramaic. And a real popular teaching idiom back then in that culture was a phrase “moving a mountain”. It meant to cut through red tape, it meant to do the impossible with God. And Jesus was using a hyperbole in His teaching. It was an on- purpose exaggeration. You know where Jesus said if your eye causes you to sin to pluck it out, and He talked about hating your mother or father in comparing to loving Him? He doesn’t really want you to hate your mother or dad or pull your eyeballs out, He’s just using an exaggeration to prove a point on purpose to show how powerful faith is.

When Jesus was talking to his disciples and said “If you say to the mountain move -and it will move if you believe and not doubt”. His disciples had sense enough to know He was using an exaggeration to show them an example of the power of faith. Now what the faith preachers did- namely Kenneth Hagan whom I love, I went through the school, I’m not mad at him, but he was wrong. What they did is they made a science of every little word that Jesus said as hyperbole; they made a science on it. What the Word of Faith does is that it teaches you that you can have what you say. They take that last phrase that Jesus said “he shall have whosoever he said” and made a whole religion on how to get everything you need from God. And the dangerous thing about it is that it puts fear in the believer.

Word of Faith people are the most legalistic, paranoid, superstitious, in-bondage people I have ever known in my life. And you know what? I’m part of the problem! I preached the heresy for eight years. I taught people they could have what they say, and that’s not what Jesus said. At the most what Jesus said that you will have what you say to the mountain.

But Word of Faith teachers and Word of Faith Christians actually believe that whatever comes out of your mouth is actually going to happen. For instance, if you say” oh my back’s killing me”, they believe you’re going to develop cancer of the spine or something. If you say “oh my heads killing me” they’ll think you’re gonna get a brain tumor. They believe that your words will create entities in themselves and they’re not.

Your words are powerful. I can cuss you out with my words and make you mad. I can tell jokes and make you laugh. I can build you up or I can cut you down. But I cannot create things with my words as is taught by the Word of Faith. So the new age message, this humanism message is that man is God, that we all together as man we are God. We can do anything. We have our own wisdom and our own life. The Word of Faith message is very, very similar. It tricks you into thinking you’re in control of your life. You are in control of your destiny. I know because I taught this for many years. It’s a cult. It was founded on cultic principles.

E.W. Kenyon was a Baptist preacher who was very involved in new age and new thought and metaphysics. He went to a school in Boston that was covered up with new age and new thought. If you’ve heard about the new book called The Secret, if you’ve ever watched that – it’s new age – it’s humanism- it’s garbage– it’s counterfeit Christianity. It’s a counterfeit faith. Okay? And EW Kenyon took the principles of the new age, the new thought, The Secret, metaphysics and he blended it in with the bible to make another gospel – the gospel of me, the gospel of my words.

And the Word of Faith was then picked up by Kenneth Hagin who took Kenyon’s writings and then expanded on them. And the dangerous thing about the Word of Faith is it’s all centered on the power of your words, being the prophet of your own life, you, as a human, being in control of your destiny.

It’s also a very materialistic, money-minded movement. You can go to any Word of Faith preacher or TV or any Word of Faith church and they can’t preach for 10 minutes without talking about money. They’re obsessed with money, they’re obsessed with wealth, they’re obsessed with cars and rings, and big churches and TV’s and helicopters and jets. It’s a dangerous movement, folks. There’s a lot of deception there.

The Word of Faith as it’s taught by Word of Faith preachers today, Kenneth Hagin, Michael Murdock, people taught like I did. I’m John Edwards, I know you never heard of me, but I taught it. Its not the new covenant, it’s not the New Testament. It’s a delusion, it is a lie, and it is a twist of scriptures. It’s designed to get your heart and your mind off of Jesus, off of the kingdom of God and on onto your bank account and on to your words. It produces fear, bondage and legalism. It’s counterfeit. It’s not the New Testament. The New Testament is about God loving you in your sins and sending Jesus His Son to die for you so that you can believe in Him and be borne again. To have all your sins forgiven, removed forgotten, so that you can have a personal Father – son, Father – daughter relationship with Almighty God to help you through life to give you the peace you need, to help you with your problems. And it’s about having eternal life. When you die you go to live with God the Father and Jesus in heaven forever. That is the good news; that is the gospel.

But the Word of Faith preachers have turned it around into a self help gospel of me. And what I want you to do is get you a New Testament, go to a Christian book store and buy the New Testament on CD and just listen to it. Just listen to the word of God. It’s a new covenant. It’s not a covenant of prosperity, health and wealth. It’s a covenant of dying to yourself to love others, to serve others. It’s a gospel of spreading God’s love to everyone. When you put others first, you love your neighbor as yourself. You put God first, you put Jesus first. You do have a God that will meet your needs. You do have a God that will heal your body, but Him meeting your needs and Him healing your body- that’s just a small part of the big truth of your redemption.

The Word of Faith is like putting a frog in a pot of water and turning the heat up, just start boiling the water, and he’s swimming around, and kicking around and he doesn’t know anything’s wrong! And before you know it –he’s cooked! That’s what happened to me! I started out wanting wanted to get The Faith. Why? So I could love God more? No. So I could be in control of my life. Look. I learned. I don’t want to be in control of my life, I want Jesus in charge of my life.